China cracks down on land sale corruption – Richard McGregor

From the Financial Times:

The Chinese government has issued a flurry of headline-grabbing edicts over recent weeks to quell popular unrest about spiralling home prices, directing banks to rein in loans and developers to build more low-cost housing.

But with much less fanfare, the authorities have been conducting another campaign which may be equally essential in cooling off the real estate market – targeting corruption among senior officials profiting from land sales.

In the last fortnight, three senior Communist party members in Beijing, including the vice-mayor in charge of Olympics construction and land, and the head of one of the largest city-owned developers, have been detained in corruption investigations.[Full Text]